Kamala Harris blasted Donald Trump as a threat to women’s freedoms and their very lives, warning in a speech in the battleground state of Georgia on Friday that Republicans would continue to choke off access to abortion if he returns to the White House.
The Democratic vice president’s visit came days after ProPublica reported that two women in the state died after they did not get proper medical treatment for complications from taking abortion pills to end their pregnancies.
Such deaths, Harris said, were not only preventable but predictable because of laws that have been implemented since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade. Although Georgia’s six-week ban allows abortions in early pregnancy to save a woman’s life, critics say the law has created dangerous confusion for doctors about when they’re allowed to provide care.
“Good policy, logical policy, moral policy, humane policy is about saying a healthcare provider will only start providing that care when you’re about to die?” Harris asked.
Harris shared the story of Amber Thurman, a mother who decided to have an abortion when she became pregnant again.
“She had her future all planned out,” Harris said. “And it was her plan. What she wanted to do for herself, for her son, for their future.”
However, Thurman waited more than 20 hours at the hospital for a routine medical procedure known as a D&C to clear out remaining tissue after taking abortion pills. She developed sepsis and died.
“She was loved,” Harris said. “And she should be alive today.”
Harris has been outspoken on abortion rights ever since the Supreme Court’s decision more than two years ago, but Friday’s speech was her first focused squarely on the issue since replacing President Biden at the top of the Democratic ticket.
Harris, who was in the Atlanta area on Friday to address the issue, heard Thursday night from the mother and sisters of one of the women who died.
During a livestreamed campaign event hosted by Oprah Winfrey and attended by Harris, Shanette Williams, the mother of Amber Thurman, tearfully told viewers that “people around the world need to know that this was preventable.” Williams said she initially did not want to go public about her daughter’s 2022 death but ultimately decided it was important for people to understand her daughter “was not a statistic. She was loved.”
Harris told the family, “I’m just so sorry. The courage you all have shown is extraordinary.”
Trump has repeatedly said he was proud to help overturn Roe vs. Wade by appointing conservative justices during his term in office. He’s also said he supports exceptions to abortion bans in cases of rape, incest or the life of the woman.
Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for Trump’s campaign, said that since Georgia has such exceptions in place, “it’s unclear why doctors did not swiftly act to protect the lives of mothers.”
Anti-abortion advocates and doctors argued on Friday that the women’s deaths raise questions around the safety of taking abortion pills at home without management by a doctor. Advocates have been pushing for tougher restrictions on the pills for years, most recently at the U.S. Supreme Court in a failed attempt to limit availability.
“Women think that it’s completely safe for them to go online and order these drugs,” Christina Francis, a Fort Wayne, Ind., OB-GYN who opposes abortion, told reporters on Friday.
Since 2000, the FDA has approved a two-drug regimen of mifepristone and misoprostol as a safe way to end pregnancies through 10 weeks gestation. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the FDA eliminated an in-person visit requirement to get the drugs. Reported complications have been rare and surgical intervention to end the pregnancy is needed in 2.6% of cases.
Dozens of pregnant patients have faced delayed care or been turned away from hospitals amid medical emergencies over the last two years, a violation of federal law. Violations occurred in states with and without abortion bans. But an AP analysis this year found an immediate spike in some states with abortion bans, including Texas, following the ruling.
Dr. Nisha Verma, an OB-GYN in Georgia, said the six-week ban has caused a “massive environment of fear and confusion and uncertainty” for the medical community.
“Medicine is a gray area,” she said. Laws “are a blunt instrument.”
She said Republican legislators who are now blaming hospitals and doctors are seeing the ramifications of the laws playing out in real time.
“The law is preventing us from being able to provide evidence-based care without having to think about the risk of criminal prosecution,” she said.
In-person early voting began Friday in three states — Virginia, South Dakota and Minnesota — and Harris’ campaign is hoping that reproductive rights will be a strong motivator for Democrats.
About half of voters say abortion is one of the most important issues as they consider their votes — but it’s more important to women who are registered voters than to male voters, according to a new AP-NORC poll. About 6 in 10 female voters say abortion policy is one of the most important issues to their vote in the upcoming election, compared with about 4 in 10 male voters.
The gender gap doesn’t stop there.
About 6 in 10 women voters trust Harris more than Trump to handle the abortion issue, while about 2 in 10 women have more trust in Trump. Half of male voters trust Harris more than Trump on abortion, while about one-third trust Trump more than Harris.
Democrats point to a series of electoral wins when abortion rights have been on the ballot, and advocates believe Harris is a strong messenger. During the Sept. 10 presidential debate she gave a forceful answer on how the bans have affected even women who never intended to end pregnancies.
Harris has a long history on reproductive health issues, especially Black maternal health. Since she took over the top of the ticket, others have toured the nation talking about reproductive rights, including her husband, Doug Emhoff.
Long, Seitz and Boak write for the Associated Press. Boak reported from Atlanta, Long and Seitz from Washington. AP polling editor Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux contributed to this report.